I’m night driving on I-295 when she turns and stuns me—a flash—with her Elizabeth Taylor eyes. (They’re violet!) Then she trots off the highway and disappears into the woods.
We’re sharing Maine with over 15,000 coyotes in 2019. The number is rising. Now coyotes are everybody’s scapedog. Police reported a possible “pugicide” (with no real evidence) on Horseshoe Drive in Scarborough recently. It became a headline. Maybe that’s why shooting coyotes in Vacationland is legal year-round (except for Sundays)—even on Christmas. You don’t have to be a Maine resident. All you need is a small game hunting license.
Visit www.maine.gov/ifw/hunting-trapping/hunting-laws/other-species.html.
Night hunting coyotes is legal from December 16 through August 31. Be careful. Coyotes may not have guns, but they’re dangerous wild animals. I understand they threaten the balance of our suburban lifestyles and chew at the edges of our comfort zones. Still, it tugs at my heart that there’s no ceiling—or “bag limit”—for the number of coyotes anybody can kill.
Why don’t we hear more outrage against killing coyotes? Aren’t they members of the dog family, too? Is it because a coyote might possibly threaten our labradoodle when we let him out for a few minutes under the stars? That tells us more about ourselves than it does about coyotes. Coyote distrust doesn’t survive a fact-check. “There have only been two recorded incidences in the United States and Canada of humans being killed by coyotes,” reports HumaneSociety.org. “In the 14-year period of 2005 through 2018, canines killed 471 Americans. Pit bulls contributed to 66 percent (311) of these deaths. Combined pit bulls and rottweilers contributed to 76 percent of the total recorded deaths,” says DogsBite.org. Where’s our hunting season for pit bulls?
Coyotes aren’t at all ugly. Neither are they ‘trash’ migrants from the western U.S. Skeletons of our wily Downeast species have been discovered in New England that date before the Ice Age. See our story “Coyote in the City” [April 2018]. They all but vanished for centuries. Isn’t there a better way to welcome their return?
If your hackles are up because Canis latrans are sly scavengers, compare their behavior to the scarfing up of free food in the Old Port during happy hour.
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